Yee: On Ottawa Council, where are the women of colour?

This year’s municipal elections come on the heels of a local push for women’s inclusion in city government and policy. In March, city councillors Diane Deans and Catherine McKenney brought forward a motion for a women’s bureau in order to conduct evaluations of policy through a gender-based lens at city hall.

The push came after international and local events such as the Women’s March and #MeToo movement spurred worldwide momentum. Federally, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made headlines with a gender-parity cabinet in 2015.

But these movements have faced criticism as products of white feminism — largely focusing on white, cisgender women while ignoring the experiences of Black, Indigenous and women of colour, and the LGBTQ+ community.

Last December, the Citizen published a feature about the lack of diversity at city hall. But the piece ended up bringing forward concerns about the lack of women on council – noticeably how only four of the 24 councillors in Ottawa were women. A letter-writer said that women should come first because it is a “much more serious problem.”

The hashtag #morethan4of24 soon popped up and candidates such as Christine McAllister, Emilie Coyle and Jenna Sudds have used it throughout this municipal election to promote more women on council and support one another’s campaigns.

But racialized folks are now left out of the conversation that was instigated on their behalf. What about #morethan0in24? What about the fact that there are no Black, Indigenous and women of colour on council?

Racialized folks are now left out of the conversation that was instigated on their behalf.

The #morethan4of24 campaign is a great way to encourage women in politics as well as a more equitable society, but it ignores those who face additional, intersectional layers of oppression. Being a woman is but one marginalized identity. Being a woman of colour within the LGBTQ+ community, for example, means facing further barriers with intersectional identities.

To their credit, the majority of women who responded to our municipal election questionnaire gave nuanced answers that demonstrated understanding, interest and a sense of alliance with marginalized communities.

This issue isn’t Ottawa-specific either; in nearby Toronto, the same problems exist. This year’s elections brought forward a crop of candidates hoping to change the white dominant landscape; but with the slashing of council from 47 to 25, the odds are now slim.

There is only one woman of colour running for council in Ottawa this year, and that’s a problem. If this election has shown us anything, it’s that we need to start finding and supporting strong members from our community to run and win a council seat in 2022.

The reason we need more Black, Indigenous and women of colour on council isn’t for mere tokenism or representation either; it is because they have and continue to be set on the margins of society and can vocalize issues that have long been ignored at the table.

Rawlson King, for example, running for Ottawa-Carleton District School Board trustee, recently responded to issues of racism in the school board. As a Black Canadian, he expressed understanding of the situation and the problems that exist in schools today. Meanwhile, at the council level, Black candidate Fabien Kalala Cimankinda is running in River ward.

So while it looks like we’ll have to wait another four years until we have an opportunity for a woman of colour to be elected onto council, this might be the year a Black trustee is elected on the school board, or Ottawa gets its first Black city councillor.

Amy Yee is a struggling Toisan/Hoiping descendant. She chairs the board of directors with the Chinese Canadian Collective in Ottawa.

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